Evangelos Marinakis has lifted his stake in New York-listed Capital Product Partners above 25% as the Greek shipowner gradually added to his position in the company.

Marinakis, through his privately-owned Capital Maritime & Trading, now owns nearly 5.06m common shares in the owner of LNG carriers, container ships and a bulker, according to a filing with the US Securities & Exchange Commission.

At today’s prices on the Nasdaq stock exchange, the 25.2% stake is worth nearly $71.7m.

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The securities filing disclosed 16 purchases by Marinakis in transactions for between 2,680 and 23,000 shares at a time since 25 May.

On 24 May, Marinakis disclosed a 24.3% stake in Capital Product’s common shares, up from 20.1% disclosed in March of last year.

“In general, I think it’s fair to say anytime the founder is adding to a position it’s an expression of confidence,” Stifel analyst Benjamin Nolan told TradeWinds.

His holding in Capital Product grows the Marinakis family’s stake over the Piraeus-headquartered company, which was launched as a master limited partnership in 2007 and has since pivoted away from its original product tanker focus.

The Greek shipping and football tycoon’s son, Miltiadis Marinakis, also owns more than 1.15m shares through his ownership of shareholder Capital Gas, which gives him a 5.7% stake.

Combined, that gives the Marinakis family a 30.9% stake in Capital Product’s common shares.

But securities filings show that since 2019 Miltiadis has also been in control of the nearly 349,000 general partnership shares, which adds another 1.7% and brings the total stake to 32.6%.